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Fencer Intel
high 7.5

CVE-2019-12420 json

In Apache SpamAssassin before 3.4.3, a message can be crafted in a way to use excessive resources.

published 6y ago modified 4mo ago also EUVD-2019-4033

cvss
7.5
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
7.2%
EPSS 7.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 94%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

In Apache SpamAssassin before 3.4.3, a message can be crafted in a way to use excessive resources. Upgrading to SA 3.4.3 as soon as possible is the recommended fix but details will not be shared publicly.

Patch / fix

  • apache spamassassin 3.4.3
  • spamassassin Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 3.4.3~rc6-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2019-12420

  • spamassassin Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 3.4.2-0ubuntu0.16.04.2
  • spamassassin Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 3.4.2-0ubuntu0.18.04.2
  • spamassassin Ubuntu Pro 14.04 LTS 3.4.2-0ubuntu0.14.04.1+esm1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2019-12420

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • spamassassin RHEL 8 3.4.2-10.el8
  • spamassassin RHEL 7 3.4.0-6.el7

red hat advisories RHSA-2020:4625RHSA-2020:3973

  • spamassassin SLES for SAP 15 SP1, SLES 15 SP1-LTSS, SLES 15 SP1-BCL +8 more 3.4.5-12.10.1
  • spamassassin SLES for SAP 15, SLES 15-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15-LTSS +1 more 3.4.5-7.14.1
  • spamassassin SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES for SAP 12 SP4, SLES for SAP 12 SP3 +10 more 3.4.5-44.13.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2021:1163-1SUSE-SU-2021:1153-1SUSE-SU-2021:1152-1

  • spamassassin openSUSE Tumbleweed 3.4.6-71.3
  • spamassassin openSUSE Leap 15.2 3.4.5-lp152.10.3.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:11395-1openSUSE-SU-2021:0551-1

  • spamassassin Alpine 3.24, Alpine 3.23, Alpine 3.22 +14 more 3.4.3-r0

alpine advisories ALPINE-CVE-2019-12420

Alpine secdb © Alpine Linux, from https://secdb.alpinelinux.org via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • spamassassin Arch Linux 3.4.3-1

arch linux advisories AVG-1077

Is CVE-2019-12420 in your stack? Fencer shows which of your repositories are affected as soon as an advisory lands, and opens the fix as a pull request.

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Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2019-12420 updated cvss 7.5

spamassassin: crafted email message can lead to DoS

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 spamassassin Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 spamassassin
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 8) spamassassin 3.4.2-10.el8
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2020:4625
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Client Optional (v. 7) spamassassin 3.4.0-6.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server (v. 7) spamassassin 3.4.0-6.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 7) spamassassin 3.4.0-6.el7
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2020:3973

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

7.23% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 94% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 7.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
NVD 2.0 5.0 AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

Affected products

  • Apache Apache SpamAssassin

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-400 Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.